


A boy of varied interests

by luna65



Category: Greta Van Fleet (Band)
Genre: Gen, gratuitous golfing references, they're all bros
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-21
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-11-01 13:57:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17868551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luna65/pseuds/luna65
Summary: If onlyanyof Danny's brothers-from-a-different-mother actually wanted to play golf...but he loves them anyway.





	A boy of varied interests

**Author's Note:**

> Just another of my silly sketches - I normally write a lot of these while I'm working out character dynamics and such. I hope you enjoy! :)

“So is it weird sometimes to be in a band of all brothers?”

“Sam and I are brothers too, it’s just - well, I could go home if he was getting on my nerves,” Danny said to their interviewer, and everyone laughed but Sam pretended to be offended.

“Never! How could anyone possibly be annoyed by **me**?!”

Danny pretended that this was true, although it one sense it was. He could remember, with perfect clarity, the times that Sam had looked across a classroom at him and there was an instant telepathy between them. Never practiced, it just _was_ , like the air. He also recalled a very early morning when, after they’d been up all night dissecting the works of Black Sabbath and Rainbow, Danny encountered a half-asleep Kelly in the hallway, each on their way to the bathroom.

“So I guess you live here now, huh?” Kelly had asked, but with a smile.

Danny shrugged. “You know Sammy, he just puts on another record and says, ‘Listen to this!’”

The other ran a hand over his unshaven face and nodded.

“That’s my boy alright.”

But it seemed rather too trite to say they were brothers; after all a band was _supposed_ to be a kind of brotherhood. He remembered when Frank started telling them a band was sort of like a marriage and Josh piped up with, “I’m pretty sure that’s illegal in our case,” and they all had laughed but Danny noticed that Josh meant _all_ of them.

And thus it was simply true, pithy or not. But Sam was _especially_ his brother.

 

 

“Samuel come get your brother out of my room!”

“Why is he suddenly _my_ brother?”

“Because he just **is**.”

“Isn’t anyone going to come golfing with me?”

**“No.”**

This rejection from his brothers who were also brothers to each other, was hurtful. But not in any lasting sort of way.

 

“Listen, Josh is never gonna actually learn how to play golf, you gotta let that go,” Jake declared. 

It was Danny’s turn to drive home after a gig in Grand Rapids and Jake rode shotgun to keep him company and also, more importantly, awake. Those long rides could be brutal at 4am, especially when it was cold and the countryside they had grown up loving the sight of was nothing but a dark void around them. Cranking the tunes and chugging Red Bull was helpful to a point, but it was the silly debates and jokes which ultimately kept them safe and sane and doing the mundane shit required to chase the dream.

On the other hand...blasting _Rocky Mountain High_ at 4am wasn’t necessarily the most invigorating experience. This assessment was borne out by the slumped bodies of Josh and Sam in the backseat. But the driver got to pick the tunes, that was the rule.

“I think if you guys just _tried_ it, you’d probably like it.”

“Nuh-uh,” Jake replied, as if to say the discussion was now forever tabled. “How many years you’ve been trying to get Sammy to golf?”

“Like, since I started golfing.”

“ **Exactly**. And no offense or anything, but, you know, we don’t all have to be into all the same things.”

“I know, I totally get that. I just think it would be cool if we could share it. Like, we all tried wakeboarding.”

“Yeah but that’s different.”

“How?”

“It just is. I can’t explain every goddamn thing to you, Wagner.”

Danny laughed. “You don’t know everything? Shit, I guess Joshie’s gonna be bummed.”

Jake laughed in turn and took another swig of Red Bull. “Hell, he’d just say I don’t know everything because we can’t share a brain, the little shit.”  
They laughed louder and their passengers both squirmed in their sleep.

“Let’s stop at the next turnoff so I can drive,” Jake suggested.

Danny rolled his eyes. “There’s nothing wrong with John Denver, man.”

“I totally agree, but not at 4:36 in the fucking AM!”

“It’s my turn to drive,” Danny replied calmly, “and you are harshing my vibe.”

 

“Danny, you gotta promise you’re not gonna quit on us even if some college scouts you.”

Danny gave Josh a puzzled look. _Where had this come from?_

Once upon a time they had gathered in yet another rundown backroom, waiting for a club manager to pay them for the night so they could fill up the van and go home. Maybe grab some snacks at the nearest Sunoco if they were lucky. Sometimes they did get tips from patrons, who told them _God bless you for doing the Lord’s work_ , and that partly inspired Josh in the moment to convince the others that they needed to present a unified message. 

“Peace, love and unity,” he declared. “Because this stuff is _holy_ to people.”

They all shrugged in agreement.

“Well yeah, it totally is,” Jake agreed. “I mean, we don’t even have to think about it.”

“I do see people gettin’ all spiritual when I play the Hammond,” Sam noted.

Danny flashed on that memory in this moment, their need for each other as strong as their need to play this sacred music, and maybe that was giving Josh a feeling of insecurity.

“Well, I mean, I guess it depends on what we’re gonna be doing, doesn’t it?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, we’re going for it so that might not even be a thing.”

“But you keep winning tourneys and -”

They all toasted him again with their cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon and the proud exclamation of his name.

“- some coach is gonna try and recruit you!”

Danny smiled wide at the thought.

“Nah...I mean, okay maybe, but who the fuck’s gonna come to Frankenmuth unless they wanted to have a chicken dinner at Zehnder’s too? I’m no Jordan Spieth or anything.”

“I just can’t go through that again!” Josh wailed, laughingly over-dramatic as usual. “You’re **our** drummer, goddamn it!”

“Ain’t nobody taking that stool from me, bro!”

The boys sat around the fire, continuing to celebrate Danny’s win but Sam leaned over to him, attempting to appear casual.

“You’d at least _think_ about it, wouldn’t you? I mean, you wanna turn pro.”

“Yeah, but I’d be lonely without you knuckleheads.”

“And we’d watch you on TV talkin’ ‘bout we knew you when you were a dork.”

“ _When?_ Like I ever stopped!”

They toasted to the notion of eternal geekdom.

“Now I _know_ you’re lying, Sammy - you guys would **never** watch golf!”

“I was _trying_ to be nice, shithead!”

 

“C’mon dude, don’t you even wanna try?”

Sam - pretending to be Danny’s caddy - lounged in the golf cart, enjoying the scenery but also contemplating it wasn’t fair that only certain people got to walk around in it, even as he realized all sports were like that, they all had their particular places in which to enact them.

“Nah man, I’m good.” He took a noisy sip from a Big Gulp, making the _Ahhh!_ sound after swallowing.

Danny shrugged and went back to setting up his swing. He was hoping for a fade on this particular hole, but his control could be iffy at times. And sure enough, the ball just continued going left.

“Fuck!” he muttered and walked out to where it had landed. He corrected the trajectory and managed to make a bogey. Suddenly he didn’t want to engage in any more course practice - he needed to go back to the driving range. He picked up his ball, shouldered his clubs, and returned to the cart. “I’m done,” he told Sam.

“Wait, that was only seven holes!”

“I’m calling it on account of extreme suckage.”

“Nuh-uh, buddy - even on your worst day you outplay everyone else on the team.”

“Not Tyler. He’s still the best.”

“Tyler doesn’t strategize like you do. He’s all frontin’ and stuntin.’”

Danny laughed. “Well he’s got that natural swing, you can’t compete with that.”

“Yeah but he can’t swing _both_ ways.”

Sam started up the cart as Danny gaped at his best friend. “The fuck you talkin’ ‘bout?”

Sam rolled his eyes. “The _drums_ , dickhead.” He threw the cart into reverse and circled back towards the clubhouse.

“Ohhhhhh. But did you see that guy at the gig last week? The blond guy hitting on Joshie?”

“He _was_ cute, sure. Like in that kinda Wooderson way, you know? Popular burn-out dude.”

In a few minutes they had returned to the cart lot outside of the locker room.

“I guess my focus is off, because of what’s happening.”

“Are you stressed? I don’t want you to be stressed; I mean, this is what we’re working for.”

“I know. I guess I kind of feel like Josh did last year. You know, when he had that mini-depression thing about not finishing his movie.”

“But he _will_ , some day.”

“Yeah but, I may not have a _some day_.”

“Dude, it’s golf. Hell, even your gramps can outplay you!”

“Wait a minute, what happened to even on my worst day I’m better than everyone else in town?”

“That’s not what I said.”

“But you _implied_ it!”

“Implied my left nut, son! C’mon, if we hurry we can hit the lunchtime crowd at Harvest and make a few bucks.”

“Did I leave my bongos in your car?”

“You leave _everything_ in our car.”

 

 

“You wouldn’t take Danny for a golfer, right? I mean, he looks like a bricklayer, would make Bonzo proud!”

Danny stuck out his tongue at Jake, but smiled too.

“I’ve taught myself a lotta stuff, you know,” he remarked to their interviewer. “But golf was maybe the hardest thing. It’s all about control. You can drive like a motherfucker but if you can’t make that ball fly, if all you’re got is chicken wing or chunks, then you’ll never actually succeed.”

She gave him a confused but polite stare in response and he smiled at her. For some reason that always seemed to remedy any weird statements. When they knew an interview might turn awkward they would just smile and be forgiven. He recalled Karen’s response to their collective smile whenever they might train it upon her.

“Oh no, don’t you gang up on me like that!”

It was their secret weapon.

In the interim of this seemingly interminable press call they made quips and played Name That Tune - but you were only allowed to hum a song. Jake immediately stymied Danny with an obscure Little Junior Parker tune.

“That was no fair!”

Jake grinned. 

“Don’t you think drumming is all about skill too?” he asked.

“It is for me, for sure, yeah - you know how hard I practiced. But I dunno, there’s something about it that feels instinctual too.”

“I don’t think it’s that.”

“That _what_?”

“What’s instinct is _us_ , man. We know what to do. Even when we didn’t know _nothin_.’”

“You guys made me feel green, though. You just have this _thing_.”

“And now you’ve got it too. But c’mon, ‘fess up, you’re a better drummer than you are a golfer.”

Danny pulled his hair back from his face, pondering the question.

“Damn, I dunno. I guess for right now I want to be a better drummer every day. How’s that?”

Heidi stuck her head in the room. “Hey guys, the next person is running late so you can take a break. Are you hungry, can I get you anything?”

“Let’s take a walk, Jakey, just up the block or something. I’m getting all cramped from sitting so long.”

Jake rolled his eyes at their publicist. “Wagner is such a _jock_ , I swear.”

“I’m a _drummer_ , goddamn it!” Danny mock-protested.

Jake clapped the other on the shoulder. “Now that’s my boy!” He threw her a wink as they exited the room and she shook her head, amused by their ever-comedic sibling dynamic.


End file.
